Page 124 of I Choose You

I finally won a smile from her with that joke.

“Please don’t cry,” I repeated.

“I’m sorry.” Her gaze darted away before she frowned at me. “I can’t do this wedding thing anymore. I can’t do it and be here when you hate me.”

I growled but tamped it down. “I don’t hate you.”

“You can’t even look at me.”

I lowered to be more at her eye level. “I can’t keep my eyes off of you.”

“Out there,” she said. “You can’t stand to be near me and it hurts so much. To miss you.” Another tear fell. “To want to be so close when you hate me.”

“I don’t hate you,” I repeated. “And I don’t want to keep going like this either.”

She gazed at me, vulnerable and so hopeful. “You don’t?”

Fuck no. I hated every minute apart from her. I loathed how I’d try to push her out and avoid feeling anything for her.

“Can we hit a reset button?”

She licked her lips and frowned in concentration.

“Let’s go back to before you told me you were trying to get revenge.”

She parted her lips but quickly closed them, hesitant. “Can you do that?”

“Yes.” All I wanted was another chance to have her. To hold her and show her again and again how much I treasured her. I would beg her. Even though I was the one who shut her out, I needed her to understand my need for her.

She lifted her hands to smooth them over my forearms, holding me to her. I cradled her face, and she let out a soft sigh. “I’d like that.”

Her words hit me in a punch. Relief quickly followed, and I showed it by lowering my face to hers.

She whimpered at the first touch of my lips brushing hers. I didn’t devour her. I didn’t crash into her like I wanted to, so empty without her radiance brightening my days. I needed her like a drug, but I tempered myself. Keeping my lips tender and light, I tested out if she truly wanted this—wanted me.

The burn of her rejection lingered in the back of my mind, and I hesitated once more.

I backed up, staring down at her as her breaths mingled with mine. Her eyes remained closed until she registered that I’d paused. She opened them, blinking to frown up at me, confused.

“Please.” She said it with the same soul-deep desperation that I felt for her. And that was all the answer I needed.

I lowered my mouth to hers once again, sealing my lips over hers. She whimpered, parting for me, and I wasted no time sliding my tongue in to taste her again. At the first slide of her tongue along mine, I groaned and fell into the addiction of her touching me after what felt like forever. Framing her face, I kept her in place with me so I could smother her with wet, demanding kisses. I wouldn’t let go until I showed her how much I needed this, how much I needed her. I feared forever wouldn’t be long enough.

My dick hardened at the instant bolt of lust she ignited. My heart swelled, racing as we reconnected, and I tried to grip my sanity before I got carried away.

Her sweet lips rose up so insistently as she kissed me back just as brutally. Every time her tongue dueled with mine, I thrust it into her warm sweet mouth and was rewarded with her pulling closer.

She grunted in frustration and released my arms. Instead, she wrapped her hands around the back of my neck before looping them over my shoulders and holding on tight.

I pulled back and removed my hands from her face to caress her neck, her collarbone, the swells of her heaving breasts, until I dragged my greedy grip over her sides to haul her to me. She let out a hard breath at contact, our bodies flush. I panted as I lowered my gaze to her.

“Please,” she repeated, leaning up to press a slow, openmouthed kiss of a plea to my lips. “I’ve missed you.” She lowered her lids, then peered up at me with such a woeful need that I growled. “I want you.”

I picked her up in my arms and she wrapped her legs around my waist as I lifted her higher yet. She lowered her face to mine, kissing me again. Still, I refrained from losing myself in her breathy sounds. I held off from surrendering to her sweet breaths and the wicked thrill of having her in my arms again. I retreated as I carried her.

She gazed back at me with such a smoldering intensity, I had to taste her again.

“I need you,” she confessed, her lips wet and swollen a breath away from mine.